Fox News personality Tucker Carlson was widely criticized after he attempted to mock liberals for "wailing" over the retirement of Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Fauci is one of the world's leading experts on infectious diseases.
He currently serves as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the Chief Medical Advisor to the President.
Carlson—in concert with right-wing news—outlets leveled relentless criticism at Fauci while undermining the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic response. Attempting to be humorous, Carlson implored his viewers to imagine the "pandemonium at SoulCycle studios across the Northeast this morning when Tony Fauci announced his retirement."
Carlson's comments came after Fauci announced he is stepping down from his roles at the end of this year after a long career of advising seven United States Presidents on multiple infectious disease threats, including the HIV/AIDS epidemic, West Nile virus, bird flu and COVID-19.
You can hear what Carlson said in the video below.
Carlson suggested liberals revere Fauci like some sort of "religious leader," referring to Fauci at one point as an "even tinier version of the Dalai Lama" who supposedly devastated liberals with his decision to "retreat forever from public life."
He went on to say the liberals supposedly wringing their hands over Fauci's impending retirement are comprised of wealthy elites who are often busy "fumbling for Xanax in expensive handbags."
Carlson also took aim at liberals for their disdain for former Republican President Donald Trump, whose habitual undermining of the COVID-19 pandemic response cost lives.
Trump regularly sparred with Fauci—even being accused of silencing Fauci after being contradicted by and taking a back seat to him during press conferences by the White House Coronavirus Task Force.
Carlson quipped:
“Imagine the pandemonium at SoulCycle studios across the Northeast this morning when Tony Fauci announced his retirement. Ugly doesn’t begin to describe it. Picture the chaos, if you can, in the organic chaga aisle at Whole Foods in Brookline."
"Try to envision the panic and hysteria that must have broken out at espresso bars in Edgartown and Aspen and Santa Monica and Bethesda as thousands of masked ladies in Lululemon discovered, all at once, that the one religious leader they still revered, their own even tinier version of the Dalai Lama, had decided to retreat forever from public life.”
“You can picture the carnage, the wailing, the swooning, manicured hands clutched to breasts, then fumbling for Xanax in expensive handbags."
“Not since the orange man seized the White House in a Russian coup have more 46-year-old Cornell-educated lawyers with weak husbands wept shamelessly in public."
"There’s not enough rose’ in Napa to quell that pain.”
Carlson's remarks exposed him to heavy criticism.
Many pointed to the hypocrisy of one of the richest media personalities in the country railing against wealthy elites.
Fauci has long been the target of derision from conservatives and members of the Republican Party. Emboldened by conspiracy theories that alleged Fauci was at least partially responsible for the reason COVID-19 spread around the world, many called for violence against him.
In April, Oklahoma Republican Party John Bennett said before a crowd of supporters he wants to put Fauci "in front of a firing squad." The violent threat prompted his supporters to erupt into cheers.
Carlson himself has repeatedly aired these conspiracies on his program, at one point alleging White people are being denied COVID-19 treatments because of their race.
Carlson's behavior has in the past prompted a response from Fauci, who condemned his disinformation as "one of the enemies of public health."
@WhiteHouse/X
